Now that the 2010 holiday season has passed in the United States, companies will be back to business as usual for the next year, and business people need not worry about entire offices taking vacation at the same time, right?
Wrong! International businesses need to plan for regional holidays that may affect the availability of clients and staff. Failure to do so may cause myriad scheduling conflicts and project bottlenecks when an unanticipated holiday arrives.
The consequences of failing to plan for regional holidays were recently illustrated on NBC's sitcom "Outsourced," which derives a significant portion of its humor from cultural differences and misunderstandings. In one episode, Todd Dempsey, U.S. manager of a call center in India, is surprised to find that he is the only manager in the area who has not planned to give his staff time off for Diwali, the country's biggest holiday of the year. This lack of consideration presents Todd with the awkward dilemma of either angering employees by making them work through a holiday as big as Christmas or taking flak from U.S. management because he has not planned appropriately...
Read the rest at "International businesses must plan for regional holidays" by Adam Wooten in his International Business column on DeseretNews.com
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